Unrest is a role playing adventure game set in a fantasy interpretation of ancient India that adapts to death, failure, and the choices you make. Play as ordinary people in a struggle for safety, freedom, and a chance at peace. Use conversation, manipulation (and rarely, violence) to achieve your goals.

Reviews

“Its heavy focus on the story does wonders thanks to some great writing, and almost every character you meet or play will have understandable backstories, motivations and traits.”
IGN

“Unrest is excellent [...] It’s not often that a game I’m reviewing hooks me so hard that I play it through twice.”
Indie Games

About This Game

Set in a fantasy interpretation of ancient India, Unrest is an adventure RPG focused on story and choices. Play as five ordinary people who are struggling to get by in the famine-stricken city-state of Bhimra.

Brave poverty, disease, treason, political and social upheaval. Face unique burdens and gripping dilemmas as you struggle to survive in each chapter...but choices made to help one character may well make life harder for another.

In Unrest, there are no heroes of legend, there is no mystical quest, and fate has not chosen you.
You're on your own.

Key Features

Diverse Characters: Play as a peasant girl faced with an arranged marriage, a priest troubled by his radical temple, a slum dweller with a dangerous past, an ambassador from a militant nation, and a mercenary captain far out of his depth - all as part of the same narrative.

Reactive Storyline: Hard decisions made in one chapter have consequences in the next. A choice made as one character may well determine the fate of another.

No Right Answers: There are no fail states in Unrest - if a character dies or fails in their objectives, that becomes part of the narrative. You can play in Iron Man mode to ensure there are no second chances, or save/load if you wish (not that we recommend it).

Complex Conversations: Unrest's dialogues are organic, branching exchanges designed to offer an unparalleled level of control and involvement to the player. You'll always know exactly what you're saying and how you're saying it, and you'll be able to see how much the person likes, fears, or respects you as a result.

Violence is Rarely the Answer: Combat in Unrest is rare and always avoidable. When faced with the possibility of death, it's up to you to decide how much you're willing to risk.

Lush Art & Music: Unrest's hand-drawn sprites and environments call to mind a living canvas, while the classical Indian soundtrack perfectly echoes the narrative's emotional core.

Mod Support: Create and share your own worlds and adventures.

Notable Mentions

Unrest is a game that makes me think of Bede, of transience and loss...Unrest captures something of the lives of people rather than the bombast of heroes and protagonists.
- Rock Paper Shotgun

I got this game in a bundle, and was really excited to play it because I love story-driven games with multi-faceted consequence/decision trees.

If you like immersive, narrative-heavy games with a good level of consequence/decision trees, then you will enjoy this game.

The aesthetics are good, the backgrounds and artstyle can be fairly charming. The storyline seems to be pretty fluid, changing in the most subtle nuances depending on your choices - definitely warranting at least a few playthroughs. After playing the extreme let-down known as Postmortem, Unrest really, really satisfied my consequence-based gameplay hunger. The music and sounds are very good, and I left the audio on for the entirety of my playthrough.

The controls are very simple, you mostly walk around and converse with different people. There are maybe one or two combat instances, which are also easy to play through. There isn't really a tutorial, however, learning the mechanics of the game is not challenging; the learning curve is minimal to moderate. Understanding and realizing the consequences of your actions, however, may take some time (and even one or two playthroughs).

Something that really interested me was the pacing of the game - as you develop a connection with your character (I am a very immersion-oriented gamer), you will find yourself put into the perspective of a new person as the story progresses to critical moments. As a psychology research assistant, one theme my lab likes to look at is bias - and something very, very interesting is experiencing the biases as you jump from character to character. I try to play RPGs as true to how I believe I would act (meaning I usually go for evil playthroughs first), but as I jumped to different perspectives, making decisions became very difficult, knowing that the consequences would most likely affect the very first character I played as. When I realized playing this way would be difficult if I did it for each playable character, I decided to take a different approach - I made a backstory for each character and played them using those stories as references. This made the experience much more enjoyable. Eventually, I also had to pick which characters were my "main" or favorite characters. This game made me better appreciate how George R. R. Martin, the author of A Song of Ice and Fire series (Game of Thrones), must feel when deciding which characters to kill/make miserable.

The different character POVs allows you to really get a more complete scope of the overarching story, and the presentation of everything is refreshing and well-done. Overall, a satisfying experience if you are the least bit interested in this type of gameplay.

If you enjoy consequence/decision trees and story-driven games, you must give this game a try.

The most enjoyable part of this game was the story. It was really interesting and inventive.

The most regrettable part of this game was that one's choices didn't really change the story much. Only very small details can be changed, but the overall story will remain the same no matter what choices are made.

Despite its flaws, the game's choices are still good to have, because they cause the player to question their morals a bit. There are people who want to help others and there are those who don't. The former have the more taxing decisions to make, because sometimes it isn't clear how to help people most efficiently.

Because the story changes perceptions from one character to the next, the player gets to see various different sides to the story, not just one character's point of view. The player could hate the sound of a character they've heard about, then later end up liking them because new information has come to light. A character could sound villainous at first, but then end up being a decent person when the player witnesses their part of the story. I really liked this concept of the game: seeing things from different perspectives of different characters.

I enjoyed this for what it was, but it wasn't what I expected. Rather than one epic, sprawling story with a single protagonist you play a few vignettes, important moments in the lives of people from all the social strata in a conflicted, starving Indian city. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I went in expecting the first kind of story and was surprised that I didn't get it, so future buyers do be aware of that.

Similarly, while the game is definitely not short on choices, moral dilemmas and intrigue, and while your choices in one section do affect the situation in later ones, the consequences are perhaps a little more abstract than immediate. This is sometimes helped and sometimes hindered by the switching PoVs; it's interesting to see what the decisions you make as a noble or captain of the city guard do to the poor people and, though more rarely, vice versa.

One playthrough took me about 4.5 hours on Ironman Mode, which I recommend, as even with save-scumming, since the consequences of your actions aren't always immediately obvious you won't often have a save far back enough to go and change something in your current game - you might as well just play one way then replay another.

In summary, this is a great, talky-choosy RPG with almost no "gameplay" or "mechanics" as such. You walk and make choices and that's it. If you love that aspect of Bioware-y RPGs you'll enjoy this game, but with the caveat that you'll have to be satisfied with sometimes vague and abstract "consequences" experienced by characters who didn't make the choices. I don't know if I'd recommend buying it at full price - I'll come back and edit this review once I've finished another run. It definitely deserves at least two, possibly more, so I'd estimate at least 8 hours worth of content.

This game is an RPG based entirely on dialogue choices. You can also move around the map outside of dialogue. This is how the game plays and some people may not find that fun. I, personally, did enjoy this system. I didn't want fancy mechanics, I wanted a story and this system was a brilliant way of doing that.

Through the duration of the game you will play a handful of different characters at different sections in the story. The story is broken up into several scenes and you will play one character until it is finished at which point both the scene and the character you play will change. And, unless the character is Asha (the princess of the human kingdom), you will never play as them again.The way you end the scene, and the things you do during it, will effect future scenes in what characters appear (I have only noticed one instance of this but there are probably more) and characters will reffer to what your character did. For example you can run away from your marriage as a peasant girl in a farm village and the owner of the farm will mention that she has had trouble with a peasant running away in a later scene.There are alot of examples of this that I could give which is wonderful. I love feeling that my choices mattered.

However I didn't get that feeling. I once tried to refuse to do something as one of the characters and the game pretty much said, "It is plot essential that you don't refuse so you did it anyway." In a game like this having control taken away from your character is pretty much the worse thing you could do.The core selling point of this game is that the choices you do matter and if the moment you try to do something that will significantly alter the narrative of the story the game takes away your choices and forces you down a path then something has gone wrong.The amount that your actions affected the world would be sufficient for a more combat-oriented game (in fact I would love it there) as the subtle strokes are so nice sometimes. But for this game it doesn't cut it.

But perhaps the worst feature of this game, the one that made me hate this game, was the lack of a suitable ending. In fact I thought I was still playing the game (the ending is done through dialogue between your character and another) and then it cut to credits. In this ending I learnt almost nothing about anything but the fact there is still tension between the humans and the naga; in every 'ending' that I got. (Even in my most naga-friendly playthrough it said, "The naga army may march on the humans." or something similar)

To summarize:It was a neat idea about civil unrest and allowing you to play as characters who influence the story but I felt as though I had little impact on the narrative. There was no closure on the stories of any of the characters (except for maybe Asha; but even then it is still weak) and I felt punished for being invested in them.And the 'ending' was poorly executed and uninformative.

I was unsure whether to recommend it or not but then I remembered that I did enjoy the game, it was interesting, so I decided on a thumbs up. The artwork is, so to speak, so-so and it has a very sudden ending, it felt unfinished to me, we haven't been given the chance to witness the result of our numerous choices and negotiations. Did the kingdom prosper or did it fail? I guess we'll never know the answer to this question. Why I gave it a thumbs up, you might ask? Well, because I enjoyed it, all the dialogues and options were interesting to read and I wanted to see what would all my choices inevitably lead to. Also, the price, it's pretty affordable for 7 hours of gameplay. I wish the artwork was better and the game didn't have to rely on good story/dialogue alone, and I wish it had a better ending.

Very interesting and engaging throughout. It is, however, extremely text heavy and is more an interactive novel than a game. In addition, the game itself only lasts a couple of hours - unless you intend to play through it multiple times to see what changes with different choices, it may not be worth $15. In addition, the ending leaves something to be desired. That being said, it is interesting and well thought out for what it is. I recommend playing the demo first to make your decision.

I recently finished playing the game, and I must say, it was very enjoyable. I, while not a fan of multiple perspectives, did happen to like this games take on it. It was implemented and written well throughout the game. I loved the charecters to, they were just written so well. The game will take about 5 hours to finish, yet you will be able to play it diffrently to have difrent outcomes. I would recommend this game to anyone who loves games with a story.

Brilliant game. Essentially, it plays like a choose-your-own-adventure, but the situations you're placed in, and the decisions you have to make, really make you think. It cleverly has you playing a variety of characters on different sides of the unrest, making what appear at first to be black and white issues to be complicated dilemmas.

Games are usually about feeling powerful. The characters you play in Unrest are often powerless, or struggling to make a difference. It's taken me just over 3 hours to complete, and in that time I've felt helpless, I've made decisions I've regretted, and I've done things against my will for the sake of others.

It did end suddenly, but in a way it fits with the game that there's no definitive conclusion. I'm left with both the sense that things could have gone very differently, but also that perhaps what happened was inevitable.

This is one of the greatest storytelling games I've ever played. Political intrigue, racism, class warfare, greed, lust for power... and you get to direct the course of events, one character at a time.

It's not about *winning*, it's genuinely about *roleplaying*. Every character you play can become the kind of person you want them to be. As saintly or as brutal as you'd like. And that's something beautiful in a game like this.

By the end of the game, I wondered about the gravity of my decisions and my tone as I made them. When suddenly in the role of the face of the violent revolution, I wonder if my gentle kindness in this role actually caused worse bloodshed? Would harsher words have made any difference? Like other narrative games with impossibly-hard decisions, choice is an illusion. I suppose this is fitting for a game titled “Unrest.” Poverty can not be solved by multiple choice questions or violent subversions.

In Unrest, perhaps it’s enough just to see what it’s like when we swap our slippers for another’s sandals?

This game is very barebones in terms of gameplay but it's strength is the plot and characters. I'd call this an adventure game with a few optional combat sections it really could've done without. It's almost a choose your own adventure type thing like "Vlad" or "Sorcery!" only done in an isometric format.

There are a bit too many quests where you have to run from one end of the map to the other to fetch something or deliver something or talk to someone. Walking is slow in this game and it's a bit tedious.

The structure of the game is pretty cool: Short sections with multiple characters telling a story of a city in the middle of economic breakdown and strife. A cool game with a unique concept.

This isn't going to be a comprehensive review, others on this page have put it better than me. If you're into dialogue-based games that make you think about the world you are experiencing, this is definitely worth picking up (even though it's short this is a reasonable price and it'll be on sale soon enough again).

I adored the dialogue in this game; it was thought-provoking, it was nuanced, and it was definitely this game's strongest point. With such a low budget, I think the aesthetic was still surprisingly consistent and I think the game looked quite pretty. As a lot of people pointed out the ending was a bummer: the real worth of this game lies in exploring the world and forming opinions and not in following a linear story but even then it was sort of disappointing. If these people had a bigger budget they could make some truly amazing narrative-focused games.

This is definitely something worth checking out if you're like me and play BioWare games solely for the story. Looking forward to their next title!

This game has a charming, story-intensive style, but it's very hard for me to consider it an RPG. Really, it's little more than a choose your own adventure game with an overworld in each of the individual sections. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, but it is definitely NOT an rpg by most modern standards.

Beyond that personal peeve of mine, the dialogue and the story itself, at least at the start, are fairly interesting and captivating, painting a unique picture about the current state of the world and the troubles it's going through. However, avoiding spoiling anything, the ending feels incredibly lackluster; it doesn't feel like a satisfying conclusion to the interesting story it finishes. The manner in which it happens, too, just seems boring.

Overall, the style and background to this choose-your-own adventure game is praise-worthy, but the gameplay itself is very limited and the actual conclusion to the game leaves me wanting. It's a bit disappointing, as someone who followed the game for a while before it came out.

That said, I think it's worth the current sale price (about 4 bucks), but my lack of recommendation is for the normal price.

overall it was a good game , i expected more of an ending to it that just wasn't there , its story was good while it lasted tho so i'd still recomend it long as your not expecting too much from the ending.

Looks great from my first play through. Lots of depth to characters initially at least. I wish there were more games based on the Indian culture and lore, there is a lot of variety that can easily make a great RPG experience in the setting.

Has a very interesting concept, but the game goes very quickly. I was finished in less than 2 hours. The game also ended very abruptly - I wasn't even sure it was the ending at first. It feels very unfinished and I feel gypped out of my $10. ):

Overall, I enjoyed my experience with this game, but it did end up disappointing me by the end. It basically plays as a Bioware game (Mass Effect, Dragon Age, etc.) without the combat and item management elements. You walk around an enviroment talking to people, picking up quests, and making decisions. You switch to playing various characters thoughout the story, which allows you to see the complicated state of affairs from different sides as the story unfolds.

The story is pretty good, and I liked how it constantly pits you up against morally ambiguous dilemmas. More than once I actually found myself questioning the principles I had chosen to stand by. I was engaged in the dialogue pretty much the whole time, even when speaking to side characters who didn't contribute much to the story.

I think, in the end, I just expected more from the game. There's a lot of build up with not a lot of payoff, and a lot of things that I expected to matter just didn't matter at all in the end. Most of the choices you make don't come back to you, longterm, in any way. I doubt that this would be different with a different playthrough, the game is just too short. Characters will aquire traits based on the decisions you make, but these don't seem to have any effect on subsequent dialogue or decisions. They're badges, basically. The opinion, admiration, and fear you get with characters through dialogue doesn't seem to affect dialogue or decisions either, and it doesn't come back to haunt you or help you later on. Most characters don't get more than one playthough, so you don't get to follow up on their story. As it stands, I can only get but so emotionally invested in them.

For what it is, this game can still be fun for the right kind of person, and I'm happy to support games like this as they have so much potential. I can see myself recommending it to a few people I know, but knowing what I know now, I doubt I would have bought it for myself.